The Children's War (90 page)

“If what you said is true, someone should be there for him.”

“Maybe someone should,” Alex agreed. “But it shouldn’t be you. I know you, you’re no more patient than me or Katerina. The point when he’ll most need help will be exactly the point when he will most try your patience. He’ll resent you. And all the things you view as helpful or strengthening, he’ll view as threatening. You won’t be able to handle it, sweetheart. You’re a wonderful soldier, honey, but sometimes you’re a bit . . .”

“Heartless?” Zosia asked bitterly.

“Oh, honey, I didn’t mean it that way!” Alex saw how Zosia’s lower lip trembled,
as if she were a little girl ready to burst into tears. He came around the table to hug his daughter. “That’s not what I meant at all!”

Zosia pushed his hands away. “Don’t try that on me now, Dad! You always left that ‘emotional crap’ to Mother. I’ve known all my life how to please you, and that was to get results, so don’t go changing the rules of the game on me now!”

“Zosia, maybe I’ve made some mistakes. . . . It was hard for me, adjusting to being here. I didn’t belong. It’s hard living among foreigners. The English, we’re . . .”

Zosia gave him a sharp look. “It was your choice. You molded me and Ryszard and the others into little war machines, now accept the job you’ve done and listen to my plans!”

Alex grimaced. Though it broke his heart to have hurt Zosia’s feelings, hugging her like that had felt unnatural and a bit silly. He shrugged and went back to his seat. “What do you have in mind?”

“I’m not going to distance myself from him. He’s a good friend and he’s getting along just fine. I’m going to help him, and I think that the best way to do that will be to get him more involved, to build up his confidence slowly. It will not only serve our purposes, but I’m sure it will help him out as well.” She paused to sip her tea. “And you needn’t worry, Dad. I won’t get hurt, because I don’t love him, and I’m not going to fall in love with him. I loved Adam, and that has cost me enough to last a lifetime.”

“Of course, honey,” Alex agreed helplessly. “Of course.”

20

P
ETER REMAINED AT HOME
the day Zosia went to her parents’. It was raining and cold, and he did not even suggest leaving the house. It was the third day in a row he had spent entirely indoors while Zosia went out visiting. He had spent his days reading and staring morosely out the windows. Once or twice he played a few notes on the piano—letting his fingers slide up and down the keys, a chord or two, a phrase from a long-forgotten piece of music. But he did that standing; he could not bring himself to sit down and play in earnest. He knew that that part of himself, his mother’s gift to him, was lost forever.

As he watched the rain pounding down, he could hear Joanna with the other children upstairs playing happily. They shrieked and giggled and shook the house as they ran from one room to another playing tag or hide-and-seek or whatever. It was Saturday and the servants had been given this weekend off as well. Ryszard would be home from work in an hour or so; Kasia, Marysia, and Anna were busy in the kitchen. Anna had arrived by taxi a short while ago and after greeting him had immediately retreated into the kitchen. Stefi and Olek
had gone on a shopping trip to the local shops; they had invited Peter along, but he had decided not to accompany them—they obviously wanted to be alone and he had lost all interest in doing anything other than staring out the window. They should be back soon, the shops were closed already. It was early afternoon, the rain had been pounding down for hours, and he had been drinking even longer.

A taxi had picked Zosia up in the morning. There were no taxi stands nearby so it must have been requested. Clearly the telephone worked—at least for some people. The taxi, idling on the street, waiting for its passenger, was the last straw. Once Zosia had left, he had grabbed the bottle of whiskey and a glass from the cabinet and had taken up his position by the window in the library. He poured himself a shot, sipped it, then started smoking the pack of cigarettes that he usually carried. They were stale; he had placed them in the pocket of the uniform without even thinking about it when he had prepared to go to Neu Sandez back in the spring. They had remained there unsmoked all these months. Now, methodically, pausing only to sip his whiskey, he worked his way through the pack. When he finished, he wandered over to the cigarette box in the hallway, grabbed a handful, gave an angry glance at the door through which he alone could not pass, then took up his position by the window again.

He smoked and drank, watching as the black branches of the trees faded into the mist that rose from the sodden earth. The whole world merged into a uniform haze of November rain: no color, no blacks, no whites, just layer upon layer of gray. The smoke from his cigarette misted on the window, and unthinking, he wiped away a bit to be able to see more clearly, but there was nothing but gray as far as the eye could see. The unaccustomed surge of nicotine caused tremors throughout his body; the whiskey soothed his nerves, made his trembling hands feel as if they belonged to someone else. Someone who was nervous. Someone who felt angry and unwelcome. Someone who was unsure of himself, scared, and alone. Someone else—not him. He was almost numb.

Ryszard returned from work, saw Peter standing in a cloud of smoke with the bottle of whiskey, and grabbing a whiskey glass from the cabinet, came over to join him by the window. Peter spared Ryszard a bleary glance, then pointedly turned his attention back out the window.

“Long day?” Peter asked for no particular reason.

“Yeah.” Ryszard grabbed one of the cigarettes from the little pile and lit it. The two of them smoked and drank in silence.

“How much do I owe you for the booze and cigarettes?” Peter asked.

“Nothing, of course. You’re our guest!”

“No, I insist. I’ve consumed more than my fair share. I’d buy you replacements myself, but . . .” He paused, then finished bitterly, “But I haven’t had a chance to get out. I don’t know the prices, how much does it all cost?”

“Forget it,” Ryszard said, obviously affronted. When he finished his cigarette,
Ryszard tipped the rest of the whiskey down his throat and went into the kitchen to say hello to everyone.

Kasia came into the library with a cup of coffee and a pastry. Peter did not look away from the window, and Kasia did not say anything—she just put the plate and cup near him. He muttered his thanks as she left. Stefi and Olek returned shortly thereafter, and several hours later Zosia and her father arrived in his car. They both saw Peter in the library, and Zosia went up to him while her father stood near the entrance as if undecided about whether to stay.

“Are you okay?” Zosia asked, waving some of the smoke away.

“Leave me alone, I have a headache,” he answered in a shaky, hoarse voice.

“I’m not surprised,” she said, looking at the accumulation of cigarette ends and the nearly empty bottle of whiskey.

He turned his attention away from the window to look at her, but she kept moving, in fact the whole damn room was moving. Shit, I’m drunk, he thought. How had that happened?

“You’re plastered!” Zosia said as if reading his thoughts. “Good Lord! Joanna’s here—do you want her to see you like this!”

“You’re one to talk,” he replied fiercely, and before he could stop himself, he added, “screwing Tadek on my bed while she sleeps in the next room!” He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Zosia’s father chose to leave at that point. He wondered if he had spoken loudly enough for him to hear.

“Shut up! You don’t know what you’re saying!”

He struggled to focus on her. His head pounded horribly. Trying to speak clearly, he said, “Why didn’t you tell me!” His voice broke with the effort, and he turned back to look out the window and light another cigarette.

“Stop that already!” She angrily snatched the lighter away from him. He grabbed it back with some force. He tried to light the cigarette, but he couldn’t get the lighter to work properly. He threw it down angrily. God, he thought, I’m making a complete fool of myself. He wished something would stop him, and as if on cue, Kasia called out that dinner was served.

Zosia grabbed his arm and gently tugged. “Come on.”

“No, you go. I’ll just stay here.”

Zosia contemplated him for a moment, then went into the dining room. She returned with some meat and cheese on a piece of bread. “Here,” she said, offering it to him, “eat this, it will make you feel better.”

He ignored the sandwich, continued to stare out the window. “Why did you bring me here?” he asked forlornly. “I didn’t ask for this. Why did you do this to me?”

She shook her head. “I’m not debating with a drunk.” She turned to leave, adding, “We’re leaving early tomorrow, you’ll want to pack tonight.”

In the evening, after the younger children had gone to bed, the rest of the family congregated in the sitting room to have a quiet drink together. Peter did
not join them, and nobody asked why not as they had all noticed his sudden moodiness. No one was sure what had prompted it, but Zosia hinted that he became withdrawn if he was in pain, and that seemed a sufficient excuse for his melancholia. They were, therefore, quite surprised when he staggered into the doorway late in the evening. He stood swaying slightly, squinting at them as though he could not quite focus.

“Would you like to join us for a drink?” Kasia suggested.

“I’m going out,” he stately bluntly. Then, scanning each of their faces in turn, he asked bitterly, “So, who has the leash this time, eh?”

Finally Olek stood and walked over to him. Gently grasping his arm to steady him, Olek said kindly, “I think a bit of air will do you the world of good. Come on, we’ll go out.”

Peter threw off his hand, hissing angrily, “Get your fucking hands off me!” He gathered himself, glared at them, and repeated, shaking his head for emphasis, “All of you! Keep your hands off me!”

The next day, on the train back to Neu Sandez, Peter had to leave the compartment several times to be sick. Each time Olek accompanied him to the end of the carriage and stood waiting in the aisle as he retched and heaved in the minuscule toilet compartment. The lurching of the train and the confined space did nothing to help him overcome his hangover. He emerged each time looking like death warmed over, and Olek helped him open the window near the door so he could breath some fresh air.

“God, I feel such a fool,” he finally managed to stammer to his companion. His voice rattled in his throat; in between being sick, he had spent a good part of the morning coughing.

“Ah, you’re human,” Olek consoled him. “And that family is not the easiest group of people to deal with.”

He looked at Olek—there was no irony intended; clearly, though Olek had taken part in keeping a watch on him, Olek had dissociated himself from the decision to do so. Peter realized with a sudden insight that he would never understand military discipline.

Zosia joined them in the aisle. “You look like hell,” she said cheerfully.

“Oh, God,” Peter moaned. He felt particularly embarrassed about what he had said to her in the library; so embarrassed he did not even want to refer to it to apologize. He made a sudden lurch for the toilet again.

When he reemerged, Zosia laughed behind her hand. “We call that giving it back,” she teased gently.

Peter slid down so that he could hold himself up by letting his feet rest against the wall opposite. The corridor was narrow so he was only down to Zosia’s height when he did that. He looked her in the eye. “I don’t suppose there’s any point in my saying I’m sorry?”

“There’s no need.” She leaned toward him and kissed him on the cheek. “We’re sorry, too.”

21

“T
RAUGUTT!
I
N
MY
office, now!”

Richard stopped dead in the corridor and pursed his lips. He blinked slowly, weighing up his response, then sucking a deep breath in through his teeth, he turned, smiled graciously, and entered Schindler’s office.

“Ach, Herr Schindler, always a pleasure.” Richard bowed slightly in greeting.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Schindler snapped, not even bothering to stand.

“Oh, just investigating housing and other details in preparation for my move to Berlin,” Richard replied suavely.

“I’m not talking about that!” Schindler fumed, waving his hand in annoyance. “It’s this!” He raised a piece of paper high in the air. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, requesting permission to nose around my facilities!”

“You’re responsible for southeast England, aren’t you?” Richard asked innocently. “I have no plans to go there.”

“Hamburg! I’m talking about my laboratory south of Hamburg!”

“I’m sorry,” Richard soothed, “I didn’t realize that was yours.”

“I told you about it at dinner!” Schindler grated.

“Oh, it’s that one!” Richard smiled. “You were so clever then as to not pinpoint its location. Now I know! But don’t worry, the Führer’s project, as I believed you termed it at that time, is safe with me. I wouldn’t bellow out the information, even in a secure building such as this.”

Schindler reddened. “Well, if it wasn’t that, why did you request a visit?” he asked rather more calmly.

“As it says in my request, I’m in the middle of studying social management techniques and ways of calming a roused populace.”

“Our society has no need of such rot.”

“Not now, of course, thanks to the wonderful social management carried out by the Party to date. Techniques and methods of enduring quality such as you yourself have displayed! Nevertheless, we must be ever vigilant. There are occasional rumbles, which we would ignore at our peril. I wish to get a sampling of the command and control structure of various social institutions, including military bases, and use that overall view to put together a report on the state of our society.”

“It’s still all rot. You manage with this!” Schindler snorted, slamming a fist onto a copy of
Mein Kampf.
“And with this!” He raised his fist demonstratively in the air.

“It’s at the Führer’s behest.”

Schindler glowered but did not respond to that. He glanced around the room
as if contemplating the possibility of unseen listeners, then in a softer tone said, “It’s not possible for me to sanction your visit to that institution. I’m sure, given the nature of your research, that you could choose another, more convenient installation.”

Richard rubbed his chin as he contemplated the suggestion. “It would be difficult . . .”

“But not impossible.”

“There are so many factors that must be considered. Size, location, style of governance . . .”

“Nevertheless.”

“There would be little sense in changing plans now . . .”

“I’m not giving you clearance,” Schindler said politely, though his lips twitched.

“I wouldn’t have to see everything.”

“I’m not giving you clearance,” Schindler repeated courteously.

“Perhaps my aide would suit you better?”

“Your aide. Yes, my son told me he applied for that position. Imagine that! And he didn’t get the post.”

“No, he didn’t. Now, would my aide be a better choice?”

“He won’t get clearance either,” Schindler replied with a tight smile. “I’m not giving you or any of your lackeys clearance.”

“Really,” Richard emphasized, “this is unnecessarily obtrusive to my project-. . .”

“I’m not giving you clearance, and the decision is mine to make, so, dear Herr Traugutt, change your plans!” Schindler stood suddenly and gestured toward the door. “Good day!”

Richard grit his teeth, then after a moment’s consideration, he gave Herr Schindler a slight bow and left the office.